Quick Q&A: Nate Ricci, Stillwater football

Nate Ricci, a senior quarterback, recently signed a national letter of intent to play next season at the Minnesota Duluth.

Talk about signing with UMD. The recruiting process was pretty long and I hadn't really heard much from them or anybody until kind of late in the whole process. And then, when I finally did hear from them, I was pretty excited. I went on my official visit [in mid-January] and I just really liked it and really liked the coaching staff. They have a really good winning tradition, so I want to be a part of that and win some games.

You injured an ankle in your homecoming game. Were you motivated to recover quickly as a senior? The game that I did miss was [against] our rival Mounds View. They ended our season actually the last two years that I was on the team. And it was pretty hard to have to sit out for that game. But yeah, I just got to physical therapy every day and worked hard. It was kind of annoying. I was in a boot for a little while and on crutches so that was kind of tough to deal with when everyone else was out there playing. But yeah, I just worked hard and tried to get back as soon as possible for my team.

Was it always a goal to play college ball? That's always been a huge goal of mine to play football. But yeah, I originally wanted to play Division I football. That was kind of always my dream. But I know things didn't exactly work out. It was always the [Gophers] and UMD that I wanted to play for, so I was happy that I got to play for UMD.

Will you play quarterback at UMD? There's a possibility. What they said was they're going to kind of evaluate me throughout my redshirt freshman year and just see if I'm a good fit at quarterback there. But if not, then I'll be playing wide receiver. ... It doesn't really matter to me. Wherever they put me, I'll do my best to play there.